


The Witch

by InterDimensional_Ventures



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: After Phil Coulson's Death, Alternate Universe - Apocalypse, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-15
Updated: 2018-08-15
Packaged: 2019-06-27 15:13:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15687981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InterDimensional_Ventures/pseuds/InterDimensional_Ventures
Summary: Set in an alternate universe after World War III (triggered by Hydra).  Large parts of the world are left sparsely inhabited due to radioactivity and weaponized viruses that have reduce humans to animalistic, zombie-type creatures.  SHIELD is working to restore the Wastelands by sending teams in to explore the Wastelands and investigate different phenomenon that they discover.  Mack leads his SHIELD team in a heavily armed truck into the Wasteland after a series of raids on human habitations on the edges of the Wasteland.





	The Witch

**Author's Note:**

> Special Thanks to @miraculousagentsofkrypton for reviewing and editing this work.

May lifted herself up so that Davis could slide in underneath her. She took her left hand off of the steering wheel as his left hand grabbed it.

“Got it?’ She asked.

“Got it,” he answered. She took her foot off the gas and slid off of his lap. She stood up in the oversized cab and stretched as Davis grabbed the steering with his right hand and applied his foot to the gas. The transition from one driver to the other was smooth as silk and their speed never dropped below 70 mph.

Daisy had once asked rather mischievously if Davis ever had any “reaction” to her sliding her butt across his crotch when they switched drivers. She had snorted at the idea and grunted, “he’s a professional,” and left it at that. Daisy had taken it as a “no” but the truth was that Davis did have a reaction and she had a reaction of her own to his reaction that she didn’t want to discuss. It had been seven years since Coulson died and there wasn’t ever going to be anyone who could take his place but… Davis’ wife and young daughter had died a few months after that when the zombies overran New Town while he was making a run for SHIELD. They both felt isolated and alone and they were both drivers so they spent a lot of time together. They were also professionals so they made sure that no one else knew how they helped each other relieve stress. It was not love or romance, it was loneliness and stress relief and they both wanted it to stay that way. Better to not get too attached, death came too easy in the wasteland.

May walked from the cab of the rig back into the massive two-story trailer it was hauling. It was a Special Cargo, Transport, and Research vehicle, or a SPECTER rig for short. It was armored, with gun turrets on top, and nuclear powered using a thorium reactor that couldn’t blow up. It contained cramped living quarters, supplies for a month, and a large configurable storage module that was currently optimized for science lab pods for when they made deep research runs into the wastelands like this one. It also had a form of cloaking which made it invisible at a distance and gave it a very ghostly, ephemeral look when you were close to it, another reason why it was called a SPECTER rig. They would need it all on this mission. Satellite photos had shown what appeared to be a massive group of zombies camping around an abandoned research facility deep in the wastelands. That shouldn’t be happening, but it was and this was a very dangerous mission.

Jemma and Leo were sitting at the tiny table in the living quarters facetiming with their daughter back at Base Camp. She was three and didn’t really understand why Mommy and Daddy weren’t coming back soon. They were trying to be happy and positive while they were talking to her, but everyone knew Davis’ story and what had happened to New Town and three other settlements so leaving her behind, even if it was safer in Base camp, was still a major source of worry for them. May didn’t interrupt their family time and kept walking.

She climbed the small, spiral staircase in the middle of the truck to the command center on the second floor. It held three seats but Mack and Piper took up most of the room so May just stood at the top of the stairs. Both were watching the monitors like hawks looking for any suspicious activity on the horizon, Mack was at the communication console giving Base Camp an update while Piper sat at the weapons console ready to destroy anything dangerous with the touch of a button.

“I’m off, Davis is driving,” she announced.

“Good,” Mack replied without looking at her, “nightfall is in 6 hours and I want you rested and ready in case we need you. Hit the sack, pronto. Tell Yo-Yo, Daisy, and Robbie to get some sleep too.”

May grunted and headed back down the stairs. She and Davis alternated shifts day and night and could sleep anywhere at any time but she didn’t know if the others would be able to rest in the middle of the afternoon or not.

She continued toward the back of the truck, past the lab pods, to the vehicle bay. It contained a car, two motorcycles, and the equipment to maintain them. Daisy, Robbie, and Yo-Yo were all back here, Robbie puttered under the hood of Lucifer while Yo-Yo and Daisy watched and handed him tools as needed.

Most people felt uncomfortable around Children of the Wasteland but not May. The radiation and viral plagues that existed in the wasteland killed most human beings, of those that survived most were transformed into strange, violent, mindless beasts that most people simply called zombies. BUT there also existed a tiny handful of survivors called the Children of the Wastelands. No one knew how they survived or why they were so powerful but it WAS known that they had radically altered DNA and sketchy life histories for their time in the wastelands. Nobody really understood them and very few people trusted such potentially dangerous wild cards. In most cases, when they turned up in human settlements, they helped fight off the zombies and the animal mutates so their presence was tolerated but they usually lived on the outskirts of the settlements, fed and clothed by the humans but also isolated from them. 

Coulson had found Daisy on one of the early research trips out from the Lighthouse when she was just twelve, at first, he had tried to find Daisy a home but there were no takers. Finally, he had brought her home with him and they had become a family of two. May had moved in with them a couple of years after that and they became a tight, fiercely loyal family of three.

Yo-Yo was also a Child of the Wasteland. Her family had made it to the research facility at Los Alamos before they succumbed to radiation sickness. It was shortly thereafter that she began exhibiting her super speed so Mack was sent by SHIELD to check her out and he ended up recruiting her and bringing her back to the Lighthouse as a member of his team. SHIELD discouraged “fraternization” as they called it between humans and the Children but it wasn’t actually prohibited so Mack and Yo-Yo eventually got married and she accompanied him on every one of his missions.

Robbie was something else. People called him a Child of the Wastelands but May knew that wasn’t true. He was something older, darker, deadlier. May would not have asked him to come on this mission but it wasn’t up to her. At some point before Coulson had found Daisy, she had somehow gotten to know Robbie in the wasteland.

All Robbie would say about it was, “Even at twelve, she was somebody who could take care of herself in the wasteland and that is pretty impressive.”

All she would say was, “He brought me food and clothes sometimes, and killed a bunch of the zombies if there were too many for me to handle.” She had also admitted that one day he had driven up and promised her a reward if she would use her powers to knock down a huge outcropping of rock so that it would fall down into the valley. She had finally managed to do so but when she asked for her reward he simply told her that it was coming and then drove off. She had been so mad until Coulson and his mission drove past her little hut and found her. They never would have seen her if they hadn’t been diverted from their planned route by a rockslide in the valley.

There was something very dark about Robbie that May couldn’t bring herself to trust but he had a history with Daisy and the girl trusted him. Mack had jumped at the chance to get the “Devil’s Driver” as the Children of the Wasteland called him. Someone who actually knew something about what was out there? Bring him on! So, in the end May had been overruled. She finally relented because she knew, that in the end, he cared about Daisy and that would have to be enough.

May realized that she had been standing there for several seconds, lost in thought, when she noticed that Daisy and Yo-Yo were looking at her expectantly, waiting for her to speak.

“Mack said we should try and get some sleep,” she said a bit more gruffly than she meant to, “It’ll be sundown in six hours and we’ll be approaching our mission target shortly after that. He wants everyone as rested as possible.”

Daisy and Yo-Yo nodded and May went back to her bunk. Technically she shared it with Davis but since they slept in shifts they were never in it at the same time, well, rarely in it at the same time. The bunk was a narrow bed set into the wall with a lamp and a very tiny amount of storage space in the form of an inset shelf and drawer in the wall. It had clothing lockers built in underneath it and a small sliding door for privacy. The others had all decorated their bunk spaces to make them a bit homier but she and Davis had not. They both kept pictures of the loved ones that they had lost in the drawer but neither one wanted them up on the wall to remind them of their pain.

She climbed in and pulled a blanket over her. Normally she preferred to sleep in the nude but that would be stupid out here in the wasteland where she might have to be ready to go in a couple of seconds so she stayed in her clothes. She turned off the lamp and closed her eyes. She could smell Davis’ scent on the pillow and sheets. She missed Phil and the way things used to be more than she could possibly explain but the smell of Davis eased her pangs of loneliness and it was only a few moments before she fell asleep.

**********

May woke when she felt the truck slowing down. She glanced at her watch, they were supposed to keep driving for at least another hour. May slid out of her bunk and jammed her feet into her boots. If they were being attacked Davis would be taking evasive maneuvers but he would NOT be slowing down, the fact that they were slowing down meant that they must have seen something out there that they wanted to check out.

She walked to the back as the truck came to a halt and saw Fitz-Simmons following Piper, Robbie, Daisy, and Yo-Yo out the door.

Mack stood by the door watching as they rushed out to investigate their find. May heard Davis walk up behind her.

“I want you and Davis to grab some food, take a shower if you want, and be ready to leave in 20 minutes,” the big man growled before stalking out the door to keep an eye on his scientists.

“We should have about 15 minutes,” Davis remarked, casually glancing at his watch.

“That’ll be enough,” May replied, pulling off her leather jacket as she headed back to the bunks, “I’ll take the first ten minutes and you can have the last five.” She wasn’t being selfish, they both knew that it was a lot more efficient when time was short to focus on her needs first, then his. When they had more time, they could do things differently, but not with 15 minutes.

“Roger that,” Davis grunted, as he kicked off his boots and dropped his pants by the door. She pulled him into the bunk as he slid the door closed.

**********

Mack walked out to the discovery without looking back. He was no fool, he knew what Melinda and Davis were doing but out here drivers were life and he had two of the best. He needed them both in top form if they were going to survive and if that meant giving them 20 minutes of privacy from time to time then he would do it.

Mack worked hard to project calm assurance when they were out in the field but his back was knotted with tension. Anything could attack from any direction at any moment and his concern for his team’s safety consumed him. He would keep them all inside the truck and just send out drones if he could but that would just keep them from doing their jobs. Yo-Yo knew him too well and casually walked up behind him and gave him a brief, high speed back rub. It was neither comfortable nor comforting but she knew exactly how and where to hit the worst stress kinks in his back and he appreciated it.

Leo was flying his drones around the area taking readings on everything that he could think of, while Jemma examined half a dozen bodies that lay in a neat row with surgical gloves and a mask on. Three of them looked like human adults and three of them looked like particularly nightmarish zombies. All were desiccated and looked like they had died of thirst and then laid out here. He saw no obvious wounds on any of them.

“Well, these three are Children,” Jemma explained, using that peculiar intonation that everyone used to differentiate Children of the Wasteland from regular children. “These three are human but have been badly mutated by the TrEX virus.” She glanced around, “I hope everyone has had their shots.”

Mack nodded, all the humans on the team were up on their vaccinations and the Children were generally immune to the half dozen weaponized viruses that ran around in the wasteland, something about their messed-up DNA prevented them from getting infected. A chill ran up Mack’s spine at the mention of the TrEX virus and he covered it up by leaning forward and pretending to take a closer look at the zombies. The TrEX virus was the worst of the worst, it gave those it infected superhuman strength, armored skin, and a rampaging, homicidal mania. Some of the viral zombies could work together like a pack of dogs but not the TrEx zombies, they killed EVERYTHING, even each other.

“Look at this,” Leo said waving his iPad at Mack. “We were actually able to identify one of the Children. This one here, Tucker Shockley. After the War he developed the ability to explode and then reform after he exploded. We have some scraps of video from both the New Town and Cross Roads massacres. He was present at both. He walked up to the gates and the townspeople were going to let him in but once he got to the gate, he exploded himself and blew the gate open. Zombies came running in from the countryside while he reformed and blew up again killing all of the defenders around the gate letting the zombies overrun the town.

“At Cross Roads, he walked up to the gate but was recognized from the spotty surveillance video we rescued from New Town. They shot him but he was close enough to the gate by that point that when he blew up he still damaged the gate. Some TrEX zombies came running up with a battering ram and finished breaking the gate open.” 

Jemma picked up the narrative at this point, “Interestingly, the first attack at New Town was very chaotic while the other massacres, starting with Cross Roads, where very well organized. At New Town the zombies came through the broken gate and the majority of people were able to escape in other directions. Starting with Cross Roads the zombies completely surrounded the settlements an no one escaped. In fact, starting with the massacre at Bliss, they destroyed the settlements so completely that we have no idea how they were able to get inside and take them.”

“How is that possible?” Piper asked, sounding a little scared of the implications, “the zombies are like wild dogs. They can’t make long range plans, they never work with anyone else, and these TrEX zombies can’t even work with each other without tearing themselves apart.”

“Something’s changed,” Mack mused. “This guy just used the zombies as a distraction so he could find what he was looking for, maybe food or women, and then disappeared back into the wasteland. Somehow by the next attack he had learned how to control the zombies and wanted to go bigger.”

“It’s possible,” Jemma agreed, “Survivors of the New Town massacre fled in all directions. Some weren’t found for months, many were never found. Among those that were found, two of them were people who had spent enough time out in the wasteland that they were changed by the radiation and viruses into Children. Maybe Shockley realized that this was one way to identify and collect Children, chase them into the wasteland and see if they survive.”

Something didn’t quite add up to Mack.

“Then why is Shockley here? Maybe one of the people from New Town that got chased into the wastelands, turned into a Child and then took over. Something changed after New Town, someone who figured out a way to control the zombies got involved. When they saw that the settlers in Cross Roads could identify him and take action then they realized that he was a dangerous liability instead of a useful ally.”

“Might even be a scientist of some sort, working the abandoned research facility up there in the mountains,” Leo suggested, nodding at the imposing peaks ahead of them. “Controlling zombies sounds like something that someone spent a lot of time researching.”

Mack nodded his head, this sounded like a solid explanation, maybe they were on track with this idea.

He looked at the dark brooding expression on Robbie’s face.

“What are you thinking?”

“Maybe it’s a scientist, maybe it’s something else.”

Mack waited for a few moments for Robbie to continue but he remained silent, turning possibilities over in his mind.

“Well, are you going to tell us or not?” he finally prompted.

“I don’t think you’re going to like it,” Robbie began, lifting his eyes from the body to Mack, “I think it’s the Witch.”

Yo-Yo acted as if she had just been slapped and Daisy cocked a wary eye at Robbie. ‘The Witch’ obviously meant something to them, especially Yo-Yo.

“You think it’s a witch?” Mack asked dubiously.

“Not a witch, THE Witch.”

“Who is the Witch?” Mack asked while Yo-Yo crossed herself and mumbled a prayer in Spanish.

“The Witch is a Child who can take control of people with a touch,” Robbie explained. “I first encountered her several years ago. I thought she was trapped in a cave by a bunch of zombies so I tried to help her. She touched me and all of my will fell away. I became a tool in her hands to do whatever she told me to do. I understood exactly what she was doing to me but had zero strength to fight it. Fortunately, the Devil came out and broke her hold over me. He scared the crap out of her and was going to kill her but she ordered a bunch of her zombies to attack while she escaped. By the time I destroyed them all she was gone. I tracked her for a while but every time I felt like I was closing in on her presence it turned out I was just tracking some other poor Child or zombie who was under her control. I never could break any of them out of her control and had to destroy them all.”

“You can track her presence,” Jemma stated in disbelief.

“It’s hard to explain but in a limited way, yes.”

“What makes you think this is her work?” Mack asked. The hairs on his neck were standing up at the thought of someone who could take control of someone else with a touch. He needed more information so he could protect his team.

“Because after that first meeting, I circled back to that location a couple of days later to see if she had returned to her cave. She hadn’t but there was this one zombie who was just standing there, not moving at all. I figured that maybe he was too far away to hear her command to attack. I left him alone and circled back a couple of days later and he was still just standing there. I circled back one more time over a week after that first fight and he had finally fallen over, dead from exposure. There was a small stream coming out of a cave a hundred feet away, it could have walked over and gotten a drink or taken shelter at any time but it didn’t.

Robbie walked back over to the bodies, “I look at these six and I wonder, were they a liability like you said or did she just park them out here and forget about them? Was this revenge? Did something chase her off and they stood waiting for her to come back? It just feels like they stood here until they died.” He shrugged, “We’ll probably never know the reasons BUT if you’re trying to figure out how the zombies are getting organized, I think the Witch is your answer.” 

“Well, at least I can confirm that they all died of dehydration,” Jemma interjected.

“Can you tell how long they’ve been out here?” Mack asked.

“Hard to say in this desert environment. It tends to mummify and preserve everything but there also doesn’t seem to be any damage due to scavengers. On the other hand, there aren’t a lot of scavengers out here to begin with since there’s nothing to eat. I’m going to guess and say somewhere between one and six months, maybe longer.”

That wasn’t a very accurate estimate but he understood why she couldn’t do any better. Seventy percent of North America was now desert and that percentage had been slowly growing over the last 10 years. He just prayed that the SHIELD scientists would find a solution to the desertification problem.

“Do you have what you need?” He asked Jemma.

“Yes sir, tissue samples for the CDC viral lab in Maryland and air and sand samples for the radiation labs.”

“How do the radiation levels look for us?”

“About twice the normal levels but not too bad,” Fitz chipped in.

“Do we tell Davis about what we found?” Simmons asked, lowering her voice.

Mack considered for a moment, he hated keeping information from his people but knowing that this guy was dead wouldn’t change anything for Davis and it might dredge up old memories and knock him off his game.

“Take pictures, record the info but we’re not going to tell him yet. We’ll wait until the mission is over.”

Simmons nodded, took some more pictures, carefully checked the seals on her sample bags and then packed her gear back into its cases. Mack looked at the sky, night was approaching fast. He looked ahead at their next leg of their route as it twisted its way up into a box canyon. He didn’t like how exposed they were up here but he liked the idea of getting trapped in a box canyon at night even less. At least out here they had room to maneuver, driving in the dark was always a risky proposition but it was even riskier in the narrow trails of the canyon.

“We won’t make our coordinates before nightfall so we are going to move the rig about 200 yards from the bodies and then button up for the night.”

Mack stood with his hands on his hips, surveying the mountains as the others all started carrying equipment back to the truck. There were no signs of anything but he felt certain that something up there was watching them.

“Don’t let your imagination run away with you,” he muttered to himself. But he couldn’t shake the feeling.

Robbie brought Mack out of his reverie.

“I want to take Lucifer out and do a little reconnaissance.” 

Daisy magically appeared at his side. “If he’s going out, I’m going with him.”

Mack’s first instinct was to say no but his control over Robbie was pretty limited and he really wanted more information about what lay ahead than Fitz’s drones could provide. 

“I think it would be better to wait until morning.”

“We are here now and she knows it, waiting until morning just gives her more time to prepare. Besides, those things have human eyes, they can’t see very well in the dark but I can. I’ll have the advantage.”

“I can wear night vision goggles and I’ll be just fine,” Daisy added, helpfully.

“Too dangerous,” Robbie objected, “If the witch is up there she could take control of you and then we would have an even bigger problem to deal with.”

“I just won’t let her touch me, you can fight her if we run into her and I’ll drop a mountain on anybody else up there with her,” Daisy said firmly. “You need someone to cover your back or she’s going to get away again, I’m going, period.”

If it had been just Robbie going, the decision would have been easy for Mack but Daisy going was a big problem. It actually made sense to send her, Daisy was incredibly powerful and he wouldn’t worry about her at all if it weren’t for the Witch’s power to take control of others people. BUT Daisy under someone else’s control was the very last thing they needed and May would NOT be happy. He made his decision.

“Alright, we need that intel and Daisy will be a major asset to you so she’s going. This is not a battle, this is reconnaissance, if you get in over your head then get out. Show off some of those fancy tricks I hear your car can do. I repeat, whatever you do, do NOT fall into her hands.” He gestured Fitz over, “Put a hub on the roof of Lucifer and data goggles for Daisy.”

Fitz raised an eyebrow but finally said, “You’re the boss.”

**********

Daisy slid the goggles onto her face and climbed into Lucifer. She did NOT envy Mack having to tell mom that she was doing recon with Robbie. Mom would be the first to tell her that she was strong and smart and able to handle anything that came her way, and then jump in front of her to protect her. Daisy felt her eyes get moist, she really was the best mom.

“Checking uplink,” she announced into her mic. The goggles were big and awkward and covered half her face but they saw everything from microwaves to ultraviolet, heard everything from 1 hertz to 200,000 hertz and recorded it all. All of that data was relayed to the hub on the roof of Lucifer and then bounced off of a satellite to the rig.

“This is Zephyr 1, receiving your data stream,” came Fitz’s voice. “I am picking up data from the hub as well so it looks like everything is a go.”

“How did mom take it when you told her I was going?”

Mack’s voice came online, “She was about to rip me a new one but I told her that you are the very best agent we have and that you were trained by the very best. I said that if ANYONE could pull this off successfully it was you two and that I had every confidence in you and she should also. That shut her up but please come back in one piece, I may die in my sleep if you don’t.”

“Got it, will do.” Robbie fired up Lucifer and they drove off into deepening darkness.

Looking through the data goggles was fascinating. She could see everything better than if she were looking at things in broad daylight. A heads-up display labeled the occasional plant and animal that they encountered and even identified unsafe rock formations that had been weakened by weathering. Daisy pulled up her goggles to see how dark it really was and was surprised to see that Robbies eyes had a faint reddish glow to them. He was the Devil’s Driver after all, and she had seen him burst into flame when fighting zombies. Glowing eyes were no big deal at all.

They came around a bend in the canyon. It was rising rapidly as they climbing up into the hills closer to the canyon’s source and the path was getting rougher. Something caught her attention up on the canyon wall.

“There’s some major boulders piled up there and a bunch zombies hunching down, trying to stay out of sight. Looks like it is their plan to either dump the rocks on top of us or else drop them behind us and trap us in the canyon.”

“They know we’re coming so we might as well spring the trap and see what happens,” he grunted.

If anyone else had said that she would have grabbed the steering wheel but she had seen the Driver do some pretty crazy stuff and she trusted him to get them out of this now if things went sideways.

“Do it.”

He accelerated past the rocks and they watched as the massive boulders crashed down the canyon wall and fell into place behind them, blocking their exit, just as Daisy had predicted.

“Are you getting all this?”

“Roger that,” came May’s voice over the headset so clearly that even Robbie could hear it. There was an ice-cold quality to it that Daisy found frightening. She was NOT happy.

“We’re moving on up the canyon,” Robbie explained. He was the only person Daisy had ever met who wasn’t even a little bit scared of an angry May. He never seemed to be scared of anything. “I’m curious to see if they’re trying to herd us into a trap or just cut us off from you.”

The silence from the other end of the radio was deafening.

The canyon came to an end with a near vertical wall. Daisy could see the outline of a slender, female figure at the top of the precipice surrounded by the twisted shapes of zombies.

“I’ve been waiting for you,” her voice drifted down from above. Robbie growled. “I knew that you wouldn’t stop trying to find me so I spent a lot of time trying to figure out how I could defeat you, or at least trap you. It took me over a year and a lot of questions asked to the people I have claimed as mine, but I have finally found a way to be rid of you forever.” The soft lilt of a mocking laugh followed her words down the canyon wall.

“This canyon can’t stop me!” Robbie growled as alarm bells went off in Daisy’s head. This girl knew what the Driver could do and she was too sure of herself.

Robbie stomped on the gas and the car shot forward, driving up the near vertical wall like it was a ramp. It launched twenty feet into the air and came down in the middle of a huge glowing pentagram. A young woman and an even younger man dressed in outlandish robes were waving their hands frantically and chanting in a strange language that made Daisy’s skin crawl. The car charged forward and hit the edge of the pentagram, bouncing back like it had hit a concrete wall.

“They’ve trapped me!” Robbie groaned, realizing what a fool he had been. The canyon was never the trap, that whole act was to get him to charge up here without thinking and land in the real trap.

The pitch of the woman’s voice shifted and became shriller and more commanding. Her gestures matching her voice, becoming even wilder and more emphatic.

“The guy is maintaining the pentagram while woman is trying to send us back to hell. You can escape now but if you’re still in the car with me when she finishes you’re going to hell too.”

Daisy jumped out of the car and aimed a forced blast at the young woman that hit her so hard she flew backward twenty feet and slammed into a boulder with a sickening thud. She dropped to the ground and lay unmoving.

Daisy turned her attention to the young man and tried to blast him but seeing what happened to his companion he threw up a mystical shield that blocked her attack. Daisy kept pushing with all of her strength while he fought to maintain the pentagram with his right hand and protect himself with his left.

“So, you brought me the Breaker of Mountains!” The witch cackled, “she will make a nice addition to my collection!”

It was hard to see her clearly with the magical fields disrupting everything but the Witch appeared to be in her late teens, tall and thin with dirty clothes and unkempt hair.

“Get her!” She commanded her zombies who charged into the circle. The pentagram affected only Robbie who still couldn’t leave it so all the Witch had to do was stay outside and she would be out of his reach. Eventually her zombies would overwhelm Daisy and drag her out of the circle.

“I’ll take care of the zombies, you take care him,” Robbie called out, leaping from his car with his chain already in hand. He burst into flames and Daisy knew it was going to be death for any zombie that tried to touch him.

There were hundreds of zombies and they surrounded the circle on all sides. Daisy had no easy way to get at the young magician but she had been working on a little trick which seemed perfect for this situation. She squatted down and then used her power to launch herself into the air as she jumped. She landed neatly on top of the boulder behind the magician. Given enough time the zombies would be able to scale the sides of it and get to her but for the moment it’s imposing 15 feet of height put her out of their reach.

“Go after the pentagram!” She yelled to Robbie. She blasted the magician from one side while Robbie attacked the magical wall of the pentagram from the other. Each swing of his chain crashing into the shimmering barrier causing lightning to arc and the wall itself to vibrate under the pounding. The magician was becoming visibly fatigued ad Daisy kept up her assault as well. A resounding BOOM from a particularly vicious blow by Robbie against the barrier caused the magician to glance in that direction just as Daisy hit his shield with everything that she had. His protection shattered and he was blasted back into the pentagram. Dozens of zombies, already whipped to a battle frenzy, tore him to shreds as the pentagram itself exploded into a firework display of lights that slowly faded away.

The Driver turned to where the Witch stood on the hill. Daisy zoomed in with the goggles to watch the look of horror spread over her face as she realized that her plan had failed.

“Destroy them!” She commanded as she turned and ran over the ridge. Hundreds more zombies came out of nowhere and swarmed down upon Robbie. He was destroying them like chaff in the wind but Daisy knew that he was still going to be slowed down enough for the Witch to escape. She prepared to make a flying jump over their heads and intercept the girl as she made her getaway.

“DO NOT PURSUE HER!” Robbie’s voice thundered across the ridgeline with supernatural power. 

Daisy looked down and saw him, in the midst of the chaotic melee, looking directly at her with those flaming skull eye sockets. He hadn’t used the full power of his stare on her but he put enough behind it that she couldn’t bring herself to disobey him. Seeing his eyes across the entire spectrum from microwaves to ultraviolet only made it more horrible. She pulled the goggles down around her neck and then sank to her knees with her head in her hands.

It took ten minutes for the Driver to finish destroying the zombies as they continued their mindless and unrelenting attack. Daisy used that time to recover from his stare. When he was done, she used her powers to gently jump down beside him as he reverted back to being Robbie Reyes.

“She got away,” Daisy mumbled dejectedly, “and it’s all my fault.”

“Your fault? Not at all! You were fantastic today, I would have been a goner without you. You’re just feeling guilty because I gave you a touch of the stare. I am so sorry about that. I couldn’t let you go after her by yourself. I couldn’t take the chance that she would touch you. If she had touched you she would have used you against your friends… against me, until we had to destroy you and I couldn’t let that happen…. For the first time in a long time I was actually afraid, afraid for you.”

He gently took her hands in his and looked deeply into her eyes. There was a softness in his expression and a gentleness in his hands that she had never seen or felt before. She had wanted this moment for so long. He was 7 or 8 years older and had been her protector when she was younger but now she was 21, now she had actually saved him. Now maybe it was time for more…

A gunshot rang out, echoing off the mountain walls.

“What now?” Robbie snarled as he looked around trying to identify the source of the sound.

“Why now?” Daisy snapped angrily. She ran around and jumped into the passenger side of Lucifer while Robbie jumped into the driver side and gunned the engine. 

Pulling the goggles on she heard Mack’s voice over the headset, “Where’s May?”

“She’s not with you?”

“No, she took one of the motorcycles and went after the two of you. When we saw those two wizards casting spells we contacted SHIELD to see if they had any info. Turns out two of Dr. Strange’s acolytes went missing several weeks ago. They had family in Bliss before it was destroyed and took it upon themselves to investigate what happened. The witch must have tracked them down in the wastelands and taken control of them to set her trap. May must have realized just how dangerous this girl was and took off after you.”

“Do you have a location on the motorcycle?”

“Sure do.”

Mack guided them carefully through the rocky, broken landscape to the location on the bike’s GPS. Daisy finally spotted two figures further down a cliff on a ledge below them. She started to charge forward to help May but Robbie pushed himself in front of her.

“The Witch can’t control me, remember? I’ll take care of her, you deal with May, she may be under the Witch’s control.”

They carefully picked their way down the narrow path until they reached the ledge.

May had the girl’s head on her lap, gently combing her hair. There was a large bullet hole in the middle of the girl’s forehead. Looking at her up close, Daisy was shocked. At a distance, she had thought the Witch was 19 or 20 but up close she could see that the girl couldn’t have been more than 12 or 13. She was just a child, the same age that Daisy had been when Coulson took her in. She even looked a little bit like Daisy.

“I couldn’t let you get away, you were too dangerous. How many people would have died if you had gotten away? Why didn’t you let me capture you? This didn’t have to happen. We could have helped you, you should have let me help you…”

Daisy put her hand on May’s shoulder, “It’s okay, you did what you had to do, she was too dangerous to let escape…”

“You don’t understand,” May sobbed, her tears landing in the dust. “I know this girl, I’ve seen her picture a hundred times. She’s Davis’ daughter…”


End file.
